The Long Dark's new event adds Canadian snacks and harsher temperatures

It may be summer in Canada now, but The Long Dark is cooling things down in July with the Winter's Embrace update to their Canadian survival simulation. From June 29th until July 31st, Hinterland Studio are dropping the temperature in The Long Dark, meaning you'll need to work harder to survive. They're also permanently adding some new treats to celebrate Canada Day.

I've always had a soft spot for The Long Dark and I swear it's not just because of the bears. Even in its early access days, the snowy survival simulation was one of the best survival games on PC. I'm always happy to have a reason to return for a new save file every few months and the month-long Winter's Embrace event seems as good as any. Summer is absolutely not my season, so I'll gladly crank up my air conditioning and escape into a winter fantasy.

For the duration of the event, The Long Dark's global temperatures, both outside and inside, are being lowered by 10 degrees. Blizzards will be more frequent and last longer as well. Yes, begone summer. Lower temperatures of course means a more difficult survival experience. Managing your body temperature and calorie intake are some of the most important concerns in the snowy wilderness.

To help with your caloric concerns, The Long Dark has also added a couple new snacks in honor of Canada Day on July 1st. Maple Syrup makes perfect sense, of course. Nothing like chugging an entire jug of syrup to keep you toasty and warm. There are Ketchup Chips as well, crisps for some of ya, which are not a snack I realized was a Canadian staple. Both will remain a part of the game after Winter's Embrace ends.

Game director Raphael van Lierop also says that Winter's Embrace is functioning as a test for other long seasonal events in The Long Dark. You can catch the full patch notes and a few other little flavor additions in Hinterland's blog post.

You can suit up for Winter's Embrace to earn a couple event-specific Steam achievements from now until July 31st at 2am BST / 10am PDT.

If you've never tried to survive the quiet apocalypse, The Long Dark happens to be 75% off on Steam right now for the big summer sale. You can grab it for £5.94/€6.24/$7.49 through July 9th.